I love my local SuperValu. I’ve mentioned them on the blog before as an example of how to run a supermarket. They do a fantastic job with their fresh produce, support of local suppliers, advice on cuts of meat and how to cook them from Denis the butcher and, for the most part, their customer service. They even provide a free home delivery service for your shopping, something Tesco charge you €6 for. You can do your shopping and leave it in the shop for them to deliver or you can send in your order each week and they will do the shopping for you. We have been using the latter for over two years now with mixed results. Things will go great for a few weeks and then it goes wrong. Below is an example of the type of thing that happens about every six weeks:
Last week we faxed in the order, the confirmation came back to say it was received at 9:36am for the usual delivery time of around 5pm. 6:30pm came and no shopping so we phoned to be told they never received the fax:
“Yes you did, I have the confirmation right here. 9:36am.”
“Well, you see, the fax goes to the office upstairs and they have to bring it down to the shop for us. If they don’t bring it down then we don’t get it. I checked with them and there was no fax this morning.”
[I'm not deterred. I've been in this situation before, to be told that they never received the fax only for the shopping to mysteriously appear a day or so later]
“You don’t have a dedicated fax in shop itself?”
“No.”
“Can I email?”
“Yes, send it to personsname@supervalu.ie.”
“That’s a personal email account, what if that person is not in?”
“We’ll get it.”
“Does that person work in the office upstairs and have to print it out AND bring it down to you?”
“Yes.”
“Well now I have two things to go wrong instead of just one, I’ll fax my order in again tomorrow.”
“Ok, but phone after to make sure we have it.”
Re-faxed the order, phoned and confirmed receipt and the shopping arrived on time. Minus bread and eggs and a few more minor things. Does a large supermarket not have bread and eggs in stock? Now I can’t make the kids sandwiches for the morning. Sometimes the missing items may be something we’re waiting on for dinner but we got wise to that and don’t order anything we need that night. This is typical of a recurring series of small issues that get annoying over time: strawberry yogurt replaced with banana; receiving 6 of an item when I asked for 18 and so on. Simple mistakes. On one occasion when I asked the supervisor why this happens I was told something to the effect of “they (the guys who do the shopping) would pick up anything”. If you are that aware of the problem then act on it! I’m not writing this without having tried to talk to the staff but it seems futile so here we are. I feel guilty as this is a free service but it’s a service I am having trouble using.
As I’ve said this is a great shop let down by the home delivery service, not by the guys like Irmantas who do the delivery but by the back-end organisation. Do it properly or not at all. With two children in the house I need to know my shopping is coming and is coming with what I ask for. Sometimes the shop will ring and tell me when they don’t have an item and other times the shopping will arrive with half the stuff missing. Sometimes they will include the original list so I can see what I am missing other times they won’t. Sadly, two years of inconsistency and uncertainty have resulted in us deciding to take a break from the service and try the weekly shop in a different supermarket. A different supermarket not out of any slight against SuperValu but one we happen to go to at the weekend to pick up a few bits and pieces. It’ll take an extra 15 minutes to get the extra shopping but we’ll have what we want and I won’t have to phone up anybody after.
I will still go to SuperValu for my day to day items and to get meat from the butcher as I think it is a brilliant shop. If anybody from SuperValu (Mr Lyons or Mr Ryan) are reading I hereby pledge to buy you a fax machine for the shop if it means I can rely on your service. Thanks for reading this far.
11/01/2009 at 4:47 am Permalink
I’ve seen so many of these systems fail because of simple lack of procedure.
I trust none of the online booking systems for restaurants or take-aways because you just know they won’t be checking regularly.
Tesco Home Delivery continues to make me laugh with some of the decisions made by the pick-up people in the shops.
Yesterday, no free range chicken, so gave us none. Last week, no salami, so gave us breaded ham!
Can they not have a list of “must substitute under all circumstances” with bread, milk etc being at the top of the list?
As for packing litres of milk on top of bags of salad, don’t get me started!
15/01/2009 at 10:28 am Permalink
If companies are going to be successful in home delivery, they MUST consistently nail a few things on every delivery. Just like you said Conor, the order accuracy, but also the quality of produce and how far out the expiration dates are on goods.
16/01/2009 at 11:40 am Permalink
Expiration date was another bug bear. We were buying for the week but were getting stuff that was going to expire the next day.